Supermodel Campbell out on bail

Supermodel Naomi Campbell was free on bail on Friday after being charged with hitting one of her staff with a mobile phone.

NEW YORK: Supermodel Naomi Campbell was free on bail on Friday after being charged with hitting one of her staff with a mobile phone.

New York media took delight in revealing details of an alleged argument over some missing jeans involving what one tabloid called the "cantankerous catwalker" after she was freed on bail on Thursday night.

The 35-year-old British model was charged in a Manhattan court with second degree assault ordered to return to court on June 27.

Campbell was arrested at her Park Avenue apartment in New York on Thursday after police were called to Lenox Hill Hospital, where 41-year-old Ana Scolavino was being treated for a gash to her head.

"She had lacerations to the back of her head," a police spokesman said, adding that the woman claimed Campbell had hit her with her a telephone.

The New York Post said the two argued about a missing pair of $200 Chip and Pepper jeans.

The tabloid quoted Scolavino as alleging that Campbell attacked her after shouting: "You're going to have to pay for those".

"Do I look like I'd fit in her jeans?" added the woman, who the newspaper described as "plump" and "short".

Campbell released a statement giving her version of events, media reported. The supermodel said she had questioned the housekeeper about missing items and fired her "for that, and her erratic behavior".

Campbell called the allegation that she attacked the maid "completely untrue".

"She is sadly mistaken if she thinks she can extract money from me by concocting lies by recycling old stories," Campbell said. "I have asked my lawyer to look into filing both theft and extortion charges against her."

Campbell's spokeswoman, Amanda Silverman, said Thursday: "We believe this is a case of retaliation, because Naomi had fired her housekeeper earlier this morning," Silverman said.

Campbell, who shot to fame after being discovered by Elite Modeling agents near her London home when she was 15, is well known for her fiery temper.

In 2000, she pleaded guilty in a Canadian court to assaulting an assistant, Georgina Galanis, while shooting a movie in Toronto two years earlier.

Galanis also accused Campbell of hitting her with a telephone.

Under an agreement reached between her lawyers and Canadian prosecutors, Campbell was given an absolute discharge.

Campbell at one point booked herself into an anger-management clinic in Arizona -- a move she later explained during a television interview with star US broadcaster Barbara Walters.

"Anger is a manifestation of a deeper issue... and that, for me, is based on insecurity, self-esteem and loneliness," Campbell said.

"I was really unhappy. I realised I was going to lose the people who really loved me if I didn't find out what was making me do the things I did," she added.

Campbell, a darling of top international designers, had an especially close relationship with the house of Versace, for whom she modeled for 12 years before an acrimonious parting of ways in 1999.